


ridges, loops and whorls

by orphan_account



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - College/University, Domestic, Established Relationship, Fluff, Long Distance Relationship, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Threesome - M/M/M, Violence In Reference To Crime Scenes, but only at the beginning, criminology, criminology major akaashi, esoteric music, forensic science, internships, lots of gratuitious detail about college in the midwest, lots of nerding out about grim history, metalwork, professional volleyball player Bokuto, social work major kuroo, true crime podcasts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-08
Updated: 2018-11-08
Packaged: 2019-08-20 20:56:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16562993
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Akaashi Keiji is studying criminology at a private college in the Midwest and getting used to his forensics lab internship. His boyfriend makes life that much better, but they both miss their professional volleyball player in Japan. When their boyfriend decides enough is enough and joins them, their lives start to change, and Akaashi wonders whether he's meant for life in an underfunded lab.ON HIATUS





	ridges, loops and whorls

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading.
> 
> a note about "one class at a time:" the college they attend is based on mine, where in fact you do take one course at a time for three weeks.

Studying criminology in the states as opposed to Japan was a jawbreaking experience.

 

Akaashi had learned about the crime in the country of his birth young, mostly through his cinema buddies, who had recommended him Nakamura Fuminori’s books and showed him black and white films his father could quote verbatim.

 

He didn’t have to guess that most of the anime nerds and kids learning Japanese that he talked to didn’t know about the underage prostitution that went on in plain view of every disinterested party. He avoided any and all mention of the yakuza: they were so ubiquitous and people assumed their knowledge gleaned from sensationalist films, comics and video games was truthful. Woe to the few who knew otherwise. Akaashi hadn’t met them yet.

 

In the past two days he’d spent acquainting himself with his internship at the forensics lab, he’d met far too many skeptics, some of whom in the span of one minute had driven him to question the use of modern forensics, and then of himself.

 

One universal truth he did not dare question took precedence over all the thoughts bludgeoning his head: he wished to every deity and forest god that Kuroo was home.

 

“Oh, thank fuck, Akaashi,” he said, throwing his stickered laptop with an exaggerated despair to the other side of the battered sofa. He was still in his pajamas, his breakfast from earlier that morning half-eaten on top of a disorderly sprawl spanning the length of the coffee table.

 

A heaviness in his heart, Akaashi closed the door to the apartment. “Tell me you didn’t miss class, Tetsurou.”

 

He immediately submerged himself in the immersive warmth of an embrace, complete and uncompromising. He breathed heavily into Kuroo’s surging chest, the scent of a sweater that had spent too much time in the back of a winter closet shooting with a sudden violence through his nostrils. He scrunched the aged cream wool in his hand, raising the hem over Kuroo’s stomach.

 

“Skyping Bokuto-san’s long overdue,” he said.

 

In response, Kuroo nudged his eyes open with his nose and kissed him.

 

“Fucking yeah.” His lips broke across Akaashi’s small smile. Pulling away, he snagged on Akaashi’s wrist, yanking him down onto the sofa.

 

Reaching for the abandoned black laptop, Akaashi settled it on his knees, stroking with his free hand at the pliant flannel of Kuroo’s pajamas. His fingers strolled up the grid of red and cream plaid and down along the drawstring, snug around his waist. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Kuroo’s eyes winking dazedly shut, his lips open with playful promise. Working the Skype up was reflexive at this point, so it was with a pleasurable surprise that Bokuto’s call came through with a view of his boyfriend making out with their new lover whilst fucking him with eager fingers.

 

“You always know what we need, ‘Kaashi.” Bokuto hadn’t left his apartment either. Then again, it was black-blue in the night where he was, his surroundings muted in the nocturnal haze of color that enshrouded the mysterious, unmentionable hours there. His eyes, in defiance, shone golden, his smile burning brighter.

 

“Nope.” Here, Akaashi nipped at the underside of Kuroo’s ear, licking it with a quick flick of his tongue. “Tetsurou does.” A distinct rumble growled through the laptop.

 

The young man through the screen faded from his focus when Kuroo snatched him around his shoulders, grunting into his open mouth before forcibly easing himself down the sofa.

 

“We’ll give him a show another time. _You_ need to get yourself outta your lab clothes and into something more comfy.”

 

True enough, Akaashi wanted nothing more than to dump the polyethylene fortress of his Tyvek suit unceremoniously on the worn-out carpet of his bedroom floor. But he knew himself better: he would hang it up at the front of his closet the minute he shook it off, laundered out as it was from a brutal day’s work. He thanked every deity he worshipped that his lab assistants constantly needled him about disposing of his mask and gloves before going home. The last thing he wanted to do was contaminate his lover with his uniform.

 

From the laptop, he sensed Bokuto’s energy radiating his assent.

 

“Back in a minute,” he said.

 

Really, he’d leave them for several, giving them time to settle into their privacy. Kuroo, he’d found, vented to Bokuto with a cathartic release he’d hitherto wished for with forgotten stars. Funny, how often those particular wishes came true. Through his partly open door, as he changed into his beloved volleyball jersey and gym shorts, Akaashi learned that Kuroo had not in fact missed class. His professor had cancelled again. This class, Statistics 2, had turned into a joke of three parts.

 

“At some point during my sobbing at my syllabus for the fuckin’ trillionth time this morning, I realized I have no idea why I need this prerequisite in the first place,” he was saying as Akaashi quietly settled down beside him.

 

Burying his nose in the fathoms of Kuroo’s dark hair, Akaashi smiled against his neck as Bokuto said, “You need it for your damn major and your damn college doesn’t allow you to take more than one class at a time.”

 

“Yes.” Cementing his arms around Kuroo’s waist, Akaashi dragged him into his lap, snuggling his curls into his woolen chest. “Exactly.”

 

“And,” Bokuto said, “I’m gonna move my ass all the way over to you before this hell’s over.”

 

In the way of science fiction films, Akaashi visualized the world spinning into a full stop, standing still in the silence of an unthinkably lonely universe.

 

Scratching at his jersey, he said, “I’m sorry, Bokuto-san, but you’re doing what?”

 

Bokuto smiled. A faint glimmer chased itself through his eyes, as if he knew full well Akaashi had heard him. “Moving. I can’t stomach this distance for another month.”

 

Akaashi had warned himself that thinking about this too much from Bokuto’s perspective might upend him. On nights his daring impulses overtook him, he’d imagined himself in Bokuto’s place, yawning sleep into submission in a Saitama apartment cruelly big enough for one more person. Thinking about Kuroo was dangerous; how Bokuto had, without warning, developed a fondness that turned into yearning for his roommate over their skype calls possessed him with an overwhelming need to hold him. But of course, he couldn’t. Distance  sucked.

 

And Kuroo was blameless in the way he thought now, staring into his open hands, ignoring the goosebumps blooming down his legs.

 

“Bokuto-san,” he said, swallowing, “you need to think this through.”

 

Beside him, Kuroo flinched. Akaashi forbade himself from diving for his hand. Whether his points sat well with Kuroo was their collective problem, but right now, Bokuto was the primary focus.

 

“Believe me, ‘Kaashi,” he said, his voice unbearably tremulous, “I’ve thought about this more than all the hours volleyball steals from my time with you two. We need to talk about this, more than pretty much everything, but you can leave the thinking about it to me.”

 

Akaashi sighed through his teeth. “Remember those words later on, Bokuto-san.”

 

In these moments, the distance reigned: it dominated the conversation, twisted their words, deepened the metaphorical and actual ocean, unspeakably unknown and dark, between them. Akaashi imagined holding him now, shutting his eyes on the sensation of Bokuto’s body clinging to him, his heart outgrowing his own strength, punishing the both of them in an embrace strong enough to curse winter into a rumored season.

 

His voice wielded a softened power as he said, “Are you doing this for the right reasons?”

 

Kuroo breathed out through his teeth. “ _Yes_.”

 

“My question was for Bokuto-san, Tetsurou.”

 

“I’m aware.”

 

This time, Akaashi breathed, in through his nose and out through his mouth, opening his eyes on Bokuto’s face, halted in twisted anguish. He sighed.

 

“You need to think about upending the career you’ve built for yourself there. That’s what you want to do right now.”

 

Kuroo threw up his hands. “What’s the problem? Help me find one.”

 

“You don’t notice it,” Akaashi said, hating himself for the new intensity in his voice, “but what if Bokuto-san does?”

 

“He’s right.”

 

They both stared as Bokuto composed himself, the pained frown now smoothed into a remarkably mature expression Akaashi was growing more used to capturing on his face.

 

“I’m forgetting my life here, and I might miss it.” He turned his head to stare at the Japanese flag, the one he’d worn with a tearful smile across his shoulders, pinned to the grey and yellow expanse of his bedroom wall. Then he turned back to the laptop, a film of his tears in his eyes. “It’s something I’m willing to miss.”

 

The first prickle of excitement darted through Akaashi’s heart, a restless comet.

 

“You’ve never been outside Japan,” he said, fighting the urge to ramble. “I can’t give you any amount of adequate care from such a massive distance.”

 

“You can,” Bokuto said, his eyes flashing with a sincerity that chilled him, “and you are.”

 

Kuroo crushed Akaashi’s hand in his own. “He’s fuckin’ right. You’ve been gearing us up for this the entire time.”

 

Smarting from the heat spreading across his cheeks, Akaashi swallowed. “You give me too much credit, Tetsurou.”

 

His blush deepened to a crimson sheen when Bokuto smiled, practically splitting himself open with pride.

 

“We love _you_ , Akaashi Keiji. Believe it.”

 

He clung tighter to Kuroo’s hand as the words rumbled with a warm heat through his stomach.

 

“And we love you right back, Bokuto Koutarou,” Kuroo said, laughing, the sound a devilish trill on a violin. Akaashi wanted to weep.

 

“If I’m not mistaken, Keiji,” Bokuto said, raising a fetching eyebrow, “don’t you have a true crime podcast to check right about now?”

  
Fuck, he _was_ weeping. Rubbing his eyes with the side of his hand, he smiled and said, “I do. But it’s time to give you a breakneck lesson on how to buy a plane ticket.”


End file.
